


Do You Wanna Make Some Snowflakes?

by babykid528



Series: Happy Holiday Fic Gifts [3]
Category: The West Wing
Genre: Chrismukkah, Crafts, Family Fluff, Gen, Holidays, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-30
Updated: 2014-12-30
Packaged: 2018-03-04 09:08:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 948
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3062123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/babykid528/pseuds/babykid528
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Molly invites Sam to make some winter crafts with her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Do You Wanna Make Some Snowflakes?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [raedbard](https://archiveofourown.org/users/raedbard/gifts).



When Sam gets home from work, Molly is the only other person in their apartment.

“Hey, Molly-bean,” Sam greets her, smiling.

She says hello in reply and returns the smile, not challenging his use of that nickname, despite having long outgrown it.

He bypasses the kitchen to put his briefcase in the study across the hall and hang his coat up in the hall closet before coming back in to drop a kiss on top of her head.

“Where’re Huck and dad?” He asks.

Molly sighs.

“Huck asked dad to meet him at the library to go over the paper he’s working on for our AP Government class,” Molly says, absently. “I’m pretty sure that’s code for ‘please help me pick out Molly’s Chrismukkah gift,’ though, since they wouldn’t let me come along. They said they would be back by six and that they would pick up dinner on the way home.”

 Sam chuckles to himself.

No one has ever been able to get one over on Molly. Not back when she was small, and certainly not now that she’s almost through high school. It never ceases to amaze him just how quickly she always sees through lies and omissions to their hidden truths. Even when distracted.

He leans over her shoulder then, taking in the scattered papers and scraps littering the counter before her. She has scissors in one hand and a triangle of paper in the other.

“What’re you working on?” Sam asks then.

“I’m making some paper snowflakes for the apartment windows,” she tells him.

Sam watches as she cuts into the paper then, movements precise and delicate, leaving behind an intricate pattern of lines and arches. When she puts the scissors down and unfolds the triangle, Sam presses his hand between her shoulder blades and huffs out an appreciative breath.

“It’s beautiful,” he tells her.

She flattens it out carefully before turning her head to smile up at him.

“You wanna sit and join me?” she asks, nodding toward the stool beside hers.

He shakes his head ‘no’ and begins to tell her he doesn’t have the coordination or the creativity for that kind of visual art. But a hint of a shadow crosses her face at his protests and he stops himself short.

Despite how independent, creative, and absolutely brilliant Molly is, she’s still a sixteen-year-old. A sixteen-year-old who was just ditched by her brother and dad for the afternoon. A sixteen-year-old who very graciously invited Sam to join her in her afternoon activity, even though she already knows he’s one of the worst artists to ever hold a crayon or paintbrush.

Sam drags his hand from Molly’s back to her shoulder and squeezes, a comforting gesture he picked up from his own dad, and he offers her an apologetic smile.

“Actually, if you’ll teach me how,” he tells her, “I would love to join you.”

Her whole face seems to light up then and Sam can’t believe he was ever planning to refuse her anything.

“Yeah, definitely,” she agrees, “I’ll definitely show you.”

He sits down beside her then and she starts her lesson. She shows him how to fold the paper, how to hold the scissors, how to control the small cuts you make, and how to unfold the final product.

His snowflakes are a sorry sight beside her beautiful lattice designs, so delicate where his are bulky, but she praises each one he makes and she scoops them all up together, when she goes to hang them up once they have enough.

Later that evening, after Huck and Toby had returned, and dinner has been consumed, and Molly is plugging away at her laptop working on her AP Government paper before bed, Sam goes around and checks out the snowflakes on each window.

He notices that only one of his ends up in the living room, one more in the kitchen, and just one more in the Toby and his bedroom. All the rest of the snowflakes hanging in those room are Molly’s.

If Sam didn’t know Molly better, he would assume she left out the majority of his snowflakes on purpose, because they were so horrible in comparison to hers, and she included the one in each room just to spare his feelings.

But that’s not like Molly at all.

So when Sam goes in to say goodnight to her before heading to bed, he glances casually at her own bedroom window. It’s absolutely covered with snowflakes, far more than any of the other windows in the apartment, and not a single one is one she made herself. They’re all Sam’s. Crowded together until they are spilling out of the glass and onto the frame.

“It’s selfish, I know,” she tells him softly, waving at the window, “But I wanted to keep all the best ones for myself.”

Sam knows that, from an objective standpoint, his snowflakes are horrendous. But Molly believes what she’s just said to him. The beauty she sees there is her subjective truth. And Sam loves her all the more for it.

He leans down to kiss the top of her head and pets her hair a few times before telling her not to stay up too late. 

She promises to get enough sleep and wishes him goodnight before turning back to her schoolwork.

Sam doesn’t linger in the doorway to watch her work like he used to when she was younger, ready at a moment’s notice to offer assistance whenever she needed him. Instead, he heads off to bed, trusting that Molly knows he’s available if and when she needs him. Even if all she needs is someone to sit and cut snowflakes with. 


End file.
